Relations between North Korea and Russia remain in a honeymoon phase, at least if a series of visits by Russian dignitaries to Pyongyang in late April is anything to go by.
The opening ceremony of the Memorial Museum of Military Exploits of Foreign Military Operations was held on April 26 in Pyongyang, in the presence of State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin, who represented Moscow. It marks the completion of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s plan to honor North Korean soldiers who fought in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The flags of both countries were raised as Kim spoke.
Five days earlier, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev met with Social Security Minister Pang Tu Sop. A meeting with the head of a security agency is remarkable. At the first session of the 15th Supreme People’s Congress in March, Kim gave instructions for a reorganization of “social security forces” into “police forces.”
Around the same time, a groundbreaking ceremony for the DPRK-Russia Friendship Hospital was held in the coastal tourist area of Wonsan-Kalma on the Sea of Japan in the presence of Health Minister Mikhail Murashko and Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Alexander Kozlov. North Korean Public Health Minister Kim Tu-won said that once completed, the hospital “will provide vitality conducive to a good life not only for local residents but also for visitors to our world-class tourist attractions.”
Work to connect the highway bridge linking North Korea to Russia was completed on April 21. As with the friendship hospital, this also responds to an agreement between the two leaders. The two countries are currently only connected by a single railway bridge, making the rapid construction of a road crossing a concrete symbol of how quickly they are getting closer. The relationship is multifaceted.
North Korea’s proximity to Russia opens the door to both reducing its long-standing dependence on China and strengthening its deterrence against the United States. It has now been seven years since the failed U.S.-North Korea summit in Hanoi, during which time North Korea has worked to improve its military capabilities and form a military alliance with Russia.
As long as North Korea can continue to sell large quantities of weapons to Russia, it will be in no hurry to have UN Security Council sanctions lifted. For Washington, this significantly raised the bar for any resumption of negotiations.
This does not mean that Kim has ended any possibility of negotiations with US President Donald Trump. North Korean media have extensively covered Israeli attacks on Lebanon, while coverage of US attacks on Iran has remained muted since the Foreign Ministry spokesperson’s March 1 statement. More than two months have passed since a joint US-Israeli strike killed Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Not only was this hidden from the North Korean public, but there was no media coverage on Iran. This silence says a lot: Pyongyang is closely monitoring Trump’s actions in the region.
Kim’s visits to military installations and weapons testing are also accelerating. Notably, the emphasis has shifted from nuclear and missile development to the strengthening of conventional capabilities. New destroyers are under construction, performance tests of unmanned aerial vehicles are underway, and cluster munitions have been tested at launch. On May 11, Kim inspected an ammunition factory and ordered a production system for high-precision multi-purpose ammunition by caliber, special ammunition and training ammunition. This is an expansion of arms targeting South Korea, the “main enemy” and “the most hostile state”.
Meanwhile, test launches of ICBMs, which serve as the main deterrent against the United States, remain suspended since October 31, 2024. Since Trump took power for the second time, it is clear that North Korea is careful not to provoke Washington too much. For North Korea, Trump is both an adversary and a potential interlocutor, but also a highly unpredictable threat.
Japan urgently needs a summit with North Korea – the first in 22 years – particularly to make progress on the issue of kidnappings, long designated as a top priority. But to achieve this, negotiations will have to be resumed between the United States and North Korea. Lacking its own offensive capabilities, Japan is not Pyongyang’s main target, unlike the United States. And it is with this in mind that it should be noted that what is happening in North Korea is not unrelated to what is happening in Ukraine and Iran.